Tree lighting shines despite uncooperative weather

A very large tree standing out the DeBorgia Historic School house was officially lit last week on Friday. Several exciting things were planned for the event, but with the weather acting up plans ended up being scaled down.

A small crowd gathered outside the old school, roasting what the guests referred to as gigantic marshmallows. Sharon Kortuem, who organized the event with the help of several others, passed out roasting sticks with a marshmallow attached as new guests arrived.

The 1920 Blue Spruce was planted by Don and Dennis Cooper, DeBorgia’s famous traveling team of brothers.

“The tree was planted many years ago when Don and Dennis were children at the local school,” Kortuem said. “They recalled jumping over the tree when it was first planted and now it’s well over sixty feet tall.”

The tree was first decorated 25 years ago by the Kortuem and her husband, Bob.

“Our family decorated it and put lights on it,” Kortuem said. “We were just tree decorators.”

The Kortuem family ended up moving, but returned to DeBorgia two years ago. In 2009, Kortuem’s son Alex climbed up the tree farther to put more lights on it and some additional decorations. This year, Charlie Stevens donated a Genie Lift and Kirt Reike hauled it over, which allowed even more decorations and lights to be put on the tree for this year’s lighting.

The Happy Homemakers created more decorations for the tree and Kortuem said this is the farthest up the tree has been decorated.

“We reached the tree higher this year, but we still didn’t get the star on the top of the tree,” she said. “But we sure did our best.”

Kortuem also recalled friendly competition between her household and that of the Coopers.

“We used to have competitions way back to see who could have the tallest tree in their home,” Kortuem said. “It went on for many years.”

Bob opened the program on Friday night. He told the audience that the St. Regis Band and choir were supposed to come and perform. Twenty-seven kids were lined up to come before the weather intervened. Betty Cooper, the wife of Dennis, was also supposed to come over from Bozeman and be the mystery guest who lit the tree, but again the weather changed plans. However, Betty gave Bob a story to tell about how she first met her late husband.

Apparently, Betty was sitting at the dinner table with Dennis and saw something black underneath his white shirt. She tried to reach down and turn the cuff up, when Dennis caught her. Bob said that Betty told him that Dennis told her that it was his black wool underwear, which draws in all the women.

“And it did,” Bob told the crowd.

Since Betty wasn’t on hand to light the tree, Carol Lynch stepped in to light the tree. Lynch was amazed at how much they decorated the tree and noted that a lot of work had been done. Lynch lives with Helen Tooker up in the old Cooper house, where Dennis and Betty stayed.

“(Betty) is quite a nice lady,” Lynch said.

Bob went onto to talk about the brothers and their travelogs that they showed all over the United States. They made films for 20 years and residents in DeBorgia said that people still come and ask if they can get films from the brothers and see them. Bob also shared some of the antics of the brothers, calling them, “some of the funniest people on earth.”

After the lighting of the tree, guests were invited to have cookies, candy and hot chocolate. Bob thanked the DeBorgia Volunteer Fire Department for trying to construct the ice skating rink. Rick Imes, Steve McCallmant and Dennis Christiansen dug in the power to the tree. He also thanked the volunteers who brought the cookies and those who made decorations.

“This was a community effort this year,” Kortuem said. “We couldn’t have done it by ourselves.”